


The Taskmaster

by devilinthedetails



Series: The Ties that Bind [10]
Category: PIERCE Tamora - Works, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Frustration, Gen, History, Knight & Squire, Knighthood Training, Practice Duel, Stubbornness, mentoring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-27
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-22 08:51:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13163478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilinthedetails/pseuds/devilinthedetails
Summary: Roald is frustrated by Lord Imrah's instruction.





	The Taskmaster

The Taskmaster

With the sound of the sea smashing against the shore echoing in his ears (because wherever he went in Legann castle, he couldn’t escape the noise of the waves greeting the coast that pervaded the place), Roald curled into a ball on his bed and read by the flickering glow of a candle on his nightstand the letters from his ancestor that Lord Imrah had lent him. 

Roald the Quiet had left Legann—adopted by his uncle Roger the king—when he was only seven, and the letters began at that point with him struggling to make sense of his adoption. His correspondence with his parents was formal, but the pain he felt at this abandonment he couldn’t comprehend was able to be read between the lines long after he was gone. Maybe it was that first abandonment that had driven him to establish so much order, so much predictability as king. 

His letters to his younger brother were more defiant—stating emphatically that they would always be brothers no matter what anyone said—and made no attempt to conceal his homesickness. While his notes to his parents tried to assume a brave tone about the changes he experienced when he came to the court, his letters to his brother were all about the confusion he felt entering a chaotic court as a newly named heir to the throne. 

As Roald the Quiet aged in his letters, Roald saw more of himself in his ancestor’s correspondence. Around the time he was ten, Roald the Quiet had started wring his g’s exactly the way Roald himself did. During page training, he had assured his parents that everything was gone and he was doing his duty. To his brother, though, he had revealed how he dreaded combat training and confessed how he clashed with the uncle he was supposed to call father because he would would rather study than hunt, which led King Roger to believe that he wasn’t a real man, while Roald the Quiet wrote how he wondered if King Roger was a wise ruler when he never displayed an interest in reading or writing laws. 

The way Roald the Quiet had groused about his training and had questioned authority in his letters to his sibling reminded Roald of the notes he had exchanged with his own sister Kally when she was in King’s Reach, slivers of his soul that were only intended to be shared with her. The thought of a descendent after his death reading these secrets confided only to Kally’s eyes made him squirm under his sheets…

A bell chimed midnight, and Roald who had lost track of time somewhere between him and his ancestor, started. Placing the book of bound letters reverentially on the nightstand and blowing out his candle, Roald thought as he drifted off to sleep that Lord Imrah had been right about Roald the Quiet not being so silent on parchment. Some of his ancestor’s commentary about King Roger and the courtiers in Corus had been downright caustic. 

The next morning a bleary-eyed Roald awoke to birds chirping with a merriness that he didn’t feel at rising with the sun as a squire must. He had a dull headache—probably from staying up too late squinting at ancient ink—and a breakfast of porridge and fresh berries didn’t abate it. 

All too soon, he was in the courtyard with Lord Imrah, locked in a practice sword bout so intense that Roald’s head throbbed with the struggle of making sense of each swift attack and parry that Lord Imrah launched. 

Sweat beaded Roald’s forehead, and his concentration must have flagged along with his strength, because in a flash like lightning, Lord Imrah’s blade was against his throat before Roald could lift his own weapon to counter it. 

“If I were an enemy, you’d be dead, lad.” Lord Imrah removed his sword from Roald’s neck and resumed a starting position. “You must be faster in the future. Begin again.” 

Roald tried to increase the speed of his strokes—which wasn’t easy when his eyes were exhausted from too much reading last night—but he made the mistake of freezing for an instant to decide if his knight master was feinting, and his pause cost him when Lord Imrah pushed through his guard to press his sword against Roald’s chest. 

“You hesitated.” Lord Imrah’s blade lingered near Roald’s heart as if to emphasize how close to delivering a fatal wound it was. “Hesitation in battle can get you killed, so don’t hesitate if you value your life, squire.” 

“I was thinking, sir,” Roald said as Lord Imrah’s sword pulled away from his chest at last. 

“Don’t think in the middle of a sword fight.” Lord Imrah shook his head. “There isn’t enough time for thought to flow to your muscles given how quickly you need to act and react in battle. You must rely on your instincts and your training. Trust in your instincts and your training, not your thoughts, to survive a sword fight. The middle of a duel is no moment to be second-guessing yourself, Roald.” 

“Yes, my lord.” Roald nodded, absorbing yet another lesson in why his most dangerous flaw was his tendency to doubt himself, which apparently didn’t only make his life complicated but also presented a significant risk of killing him.

He was so determined to improve his speed that he quickened the pace of his movements so much that his form suffered. Lord Imrah took advantage of his sloppiness to rest his sword beneath Roald’s chin again. 

“Your form was a mess.” Lord Imrah’s eyes swept over Roald in a manner that made it clear as crystal that he had seen every lapse in his squire’s technique. “Attacks and parries only work well when performed properly, lad.” 

Remembering how Lord Imrah had promised him when he became his squire that he was a less severe taskmaster than Lord Wyldon, Roald mentally begged to differ. Lord Imrah may not have been as forbidding an instructor as Lord Wyldon, but in many ways he was more exacting. In training, Lord Wyldon was ever ready to point out an error—correcting footwork or thrusting a block higher—but his attention was divided among all the pages, and he would rarely dissect every flaw in a particular page’s performance. With Lord Imrah, it was different. Every fault was focused on, and Lord Imrah’s hawk eyes never missed any weakness in Roald. 

“Would you prefer that I improve my speed or pay attention to my technique, my lord?” Roald took a deep breath, filling his lungs with much needed air, and thinking that he couldn’t have devised a politer fashion of pointing out that his knightmaster was asking him to do too much at once. 

“Both, Roald.” Lord Imrah arched an eyebrow. “Form without speed avails you nothing, and vice versa. That is what I’m explaining to you. Now, focusing on form and speed, let’s try again.” 

Roald was so frustrated that his knightmaster was asking him to do what he perceived as impossible—increasing his speed without sacrificing any of his technique—that he attacked with a wild ferocity that ended with a literal misstep that brought Lord Imrah’s sword to his heaving chest again. 

“Your frustration made you sloppy, squire.” Lord Imrah’s lips thinned in what Roald recognized as a sure sign of disapproval. “You attacked with impulsivity rather than with discipline. Your frustration can be the death of you if you don’t master it even in the heat of combat.” 

Roald bit back a snide observation that he had every reason to be frustrated when he was receiving advice from his knightmaster that utterly unfeasible to implement because squires weren’t supposed to argue with any lesson. Through gritted teeth, he instead ground out, “Yes, sir.” 

“You aren’t listening.” Lord Imrah sighed. “That’s why you’re struggling, Roald.” 

“I am listening, my lord,” protesting Roald, thinking that it was unfair that his knightmaster was now inventing offenses he had never committed. “I’m having difficulty doing what you’re saying, but I’m paying attention.” 

“If you tried harder to do what I told you, which is what you’d do if you were serious about listening to my instruction, you’d succeed.” Lord Imrah grasped Roald’s sweat-soaked shoulders and gave a firm shake. “I’m not demanding the impossible from you, just an honest effort.” 

“I’m trying as hard as I can, sir.” Roald’s jaw tightened. He was frustrated precisely since he was trying so hard. Lord Imrah’s reprimands felt as if they were becoming ever more unjust and unmoored from reality. 

“You’re being stubborn, squire.” Lord Imrah reached out to clasp Roald’s rebelliously raised chin. “You may be soft-spoken which leads some people to underestimate you at their own peril, but I know you’re one of the most tenacious individuals I’ve ever met. When you resolve to do something, you’ll achieve it. That’s why I realize that you aren’t able to do what I’m telling you because you’re determinedly resisting my advice. You’re trying as hard as you can not to do what I say. If you channeled half as much energy into heeding my words as you have into resisting them, you’d make great great strides with your sword work.” 

“I’m just frustrated.” Flushing to the roots of his coal-black hair as he mopped the sweat from his furrowed brow, Roald thought that his Conte stubbornness must be so innate that he drew on it without any conscious effort. He hadn’t meant to dig in his heels against his knight master, but now he was abashed to realize that he probably had done just that. Even more humiliating was the epiphany that he wasn’t certain he could redirect his headstrong tendencies even after Lord Imrah had pointed out the issue to him. Right now, his stubbornness had the reigns and he was just along for the bucking ride. “I’m not trying to be stubborn. Forgive me, my lord.” 

“If you’re that frustrated, we’ll only get diminishing returns from continuing to train right now.” Nodding toward the castle, Lord Imrah commanded crisply, “Go up to the library. Read any book that captures your interest, and be prepared to report to me on what you’ve learned when I come up to join you, Roald.” 

“Is that a punishment, my lord?” Cocking his head, Roald figured miserably that he was used to extra classwork being assigned as punishment and that there probably wasn’t much else to be done with a squire so hopelessly stubborn that he could be obstinate without even trying. 

“No, it’s not a punishment. It’s to educate you and to calm you down, lad.” Lord Imrah nudged Roald toward the castle. “It is, however, an order, so off you go.”


End file.
